Category Archives: Education and Economy

September Government Relations Update

Education Highlights from Democratic and GOP Platforms With the nominating conventions behind us, both the Republican and Democratic parties laid out further their stances on education in their respective party platforms: Democratic Party – The 2012 Democratic platform emphasized the importance of education throughout the document, echoed by President Obama’s acceptance speech. Education was cited […]

Five Questions You Should Answer About Your Top Accounts

With the start of the school year just around the corner (or already underway in a few states), CEOs are most likely focused on delivery during this crucial time of year. While successful back-to-school delivery is important, what companies should really be focused on is ensuring strong implementations that will lead to renewals. Now is […]

August Government Relations Update

Federal FY13 Budget With Congress on its August recess, the FY13 budget and potential cuts to education programs will not be hammered out until next month at the earliest, though it is entirely possible that a continuing resolution (or a series of them) will keep the government funded through 2013, as both parties hope to […]

Increasing Your Profit – Without Changing Your Product

In this economy, the idea of increasing your prices may seem suicidal – and indeed, raising them indiscriminately will probably backfire. However, it is possible to set your prices in such a way that you can increase your profits without changing your product or tinkering with your overhead. Traditionally, setting a price for a product […]

July Government Relations Update

Mayors Endorse “Parent-Trigger” Efforts Nationwide At their annual conference last month, the U.S. Conference of Mayors endorsed so-called “parent-trigger” laws that enable parents to take over failing schools to implement personnel and program changes. Though the laws are opposed by teachers’ unions, support for the laws among the nation’s mayors crosses party lines, including Chicago […]

The Dual Benefit of Targeting End-of-Year Budgets

While the fiscal climate for school budgets next year remains unclear, you can be sure that every superintendent and administrator knows that their budget needs to be completely spent down by the end of this month.  Of course, many districts have long ago accounted for every penny in their FY12 budgets, but the last week […]

June Government Relations Update

FY13 Education Budget and STEM Funding On June 14, the Senate Appropriations Committee released its version of the FY13 education budget. (As of this writing, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, HHS, Education, and Related Agencies had yet to finish its version of the bill). Under the Senate version, the Department of Education would receive […]

The “Rising Billion” and Your Business Model

What would your company look like if your content or app could reach 1 billion more people than you are reaching today? And what if that group was a self-driven, DIY-inclined audience who are not only consumers of your product, but potential improvers and collaborators? A new book, “Abundance: The Future is Better Than You […]

May Government Relations Update

Your Ticket to the 2012 Elections With another election season in full swing, Rita Ferrandino will be in the middle of all the excitement. In addition to her work with Arc and as the CEO of Chicago Educational Publishing Company and as a founding partner of Arc Capital Development, Rita also serves as the Chair of […]

April Government Relations Update

Education Cuts in the Florida Budget Rita Ferrandino authored a blog post for Sarasota Patch examining education spending in the recently signed $70 billion Florida state budget. Rita notes that while the budget “ostensibly provides a $1 billion funding “increase” for K-12 education, that hardly offsets last year’s cut of $1.3 billion, let alone provides […]